MORE than eight of 10 mortgages which are sold by Scottish finance firms are to customers south of the Border, the leader of Scotland’s Tories said yesterday.

Ruth Davidson said the absence of trade barriers has helped Scotland become more prosperous

Ruth Davidson, who was addressing a meeting in Edinburgh of the Conservative Friends of the Union, said that the absence of trade barriers, which we all take for granted, has helped Scotland become more successful and more prosperous than it otherwise would have been.

Miss Davidson said that Scotland exports twice as much to England as to any other part of the world, with trade in the rest of the UK increasing by more than 60 per cent in a decade.

She said: “If we were to leave the UK, it would inevitably mean one set of rules and regulations in Scotland and another set across the Border in the rest of the UK.

“Different financial regulations, different employment laws, different insurance requirements, different tax authorities, different accreditations and qualifications, with which small firms would be obliged to contend – are all barriers to trade, obstructions to economic growth and impediments to the job creation in Scotland that we all want to see.

“The financial services industry supports more than 160,000 jobs and accounts for £9.9billion worth of business conducted with the rest of the UK. And about 84 per cent of mortgages sold by Scottish firms were to people in the rest of the UK.”

Ruth Davidson’s latest feeble contribution to the No camp’s self-styled Project Fear is riddled with bogus and redundant arguments

First Minister Alex Salmond's spokesman

A spokesman for the First Minister said: “It has been a bad summer from the No campaign as their scare stories have rebounded and they have lost support.

“An independent Scotland will mean that decisions will be taken here in Scotland.

“Ruth Davidson’s latest feeble contribution to the No camp’s self-styled Project Fear is riddled with bogus and redundant arguments.”